Two Designers Walk Into A Bar

Episode 10: Union 76, Holiday Inn and Signs from the Open Road

Released January 20, 2021
© 2021 Two Designers Media, LLC

Two designers walk into a bar is a proud member of the Evergreen Podcasts Network. For more information about our show, or to discover more podcasts you'll enjoy, visit evergreen podcasts.com. So these were these massive five story tall, double-sided. Holly Holiday Hollywood in, I thought you were making up a new shape.

A Holiday Inn sign.

Welcome to two designers walking into a bar, a place where pop culture creatives, discover design icons that make us tick, and we share a few cocktails in the process. Yep. Today we're discussing Roadside Beauties, a couple of those iconic signs that were beacons of comfort and convenience. For mid-century travelers taking advantage of their middle class position and our country's expanding interstate.

So pull off at the nearest rest, stop and grab a sandwich from that cooler in your backseat and take a journey with us once again as we stroll back into the bar

today. You know, guess what we're gonna talk about? We're gonna talk about those. Be. Roadside signs that we see, uh, driving up and down the highway on those long family boring trips. And these are the little design beauties that get us excited along the way. So, Elliot, yes, I got a great one for you. This is totally of the period of the sixties and seventies and started in California, but I'm sure you're a hundred percent familiar with the union, 76 orange ball.

Oh, yes. I loved that when I was little. Loved, loved, loved. Yeah. Yeah. It was so simple, right? So, a little background. These were used for gas station signs. They were just big orange spheres. Uh, if you haven't seen it, there are pictures on our website. 76 was written in blue with a heavyweight sandsara.

Looks kind of like a, a modified italic fut. And has a white outline. And on top of that, they plused it up and it rotated and was lighted. So these giant eight foot wide orange balls, uh, would tell you that there was, uh, a Union 76 station right directly under it. So a little bit about the, the company here through a series of sales and mergers.

It's now owned by Phillips 66 Company, oddly. But it was made famous by the Union Oil Company of California, which is based in El Segundo, which I think you left your wallet there one time. I did. I did. You beat me to that one. Oh, sorry, sorry, sorry man. Um, I'm sure you'll get the next one. Um, anyway, union Oil introduced 76 gasoline way back in 1932, and the name referred to 1776 and the declaration of I.

Uh, which I know was important to you from our 1976 bicentennial episode. Yes. So it was sort of that idea of freedom, the open road, and it also happened to be the gasoline's octane rating in 1932. So they, uh, experienced a lot of cross-country expansion, particularly in the sixties and seventies. They started using the slogan, go with the Spirit, the spirit of 76, and later it was shortened to get the.

So anyway about these orange balls, really unique for signage. I think you'd agree. It was first designed by a creative director from LA's Young and Rubic can called Ray Peterson, and he was doing advertising for Union Oil in 76 and he was tasked to do, uh, sponsor. Uh, signage for the 1962 Seattle World's Fair Sky Ride, which is, you know, one of those things you get in, it hauls you over the fair and puts you out like a mile somewhere else later.

But anyway, at the time, they were just using the flat lollipop sign, just a round circle, said 76 and Ray Peterson. He thought those were boring and he thought it didn't really evolve much, particularly for something as high profile as a World's Fair. And he also, We should be able to see it from more than just two sides.

So this was one of those aha moments where he woke up in the middle of the night and had this idea of a giant orange ball. And, uh, so it was three dimensional and it rotated and you could see it from all sides. So here's the funny thing though. So it was first launched in, uh, 1962, as I said, at the Seattle World's Fair and the original one, cost.

Hold onto your hat, Elliot, $50,000. In 1962, what would that be today? Do you know? Did you run the numbers? No, I didn't. I don't know today. Um, you know, my guess is but probably double right? A hundred thousand. Oh, at least. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I'll look that up cuz it would be good to know. But yeah, $50,000 for one, and as I said before, it was eight foot.

And once it was installed, the senior vice president who was in charge of that project said, we've gotta put one of these on every station we own. So I'm assuming they all didn't cost $50,000. I'm assuming they got a pretty good deal because at their peak in 1969, They reported having more than 18,000 of these orange lighted balls spinning around the corners, uh, of gas stations in about 37 American states.

I can attest to that. So if it started in California, but I remember seeing them, you know, as a little kid in the Midwest. They absolutely were all over the. All over the place. And on top of that, uh, you probably remember the orange 76 antenna ball that would go on top of your aerial antenna. They invented those things.

They invented the antenna ball. That's wonderful. . Isn't that cool? That's great. Um, so you know, you could fly your own orange ball, 76. Wherever you went. And if you were on the road traveling for long periods of time and you happened to encounter heavy snow somewhere in the Midwest, uh, you could also see the orange balls poke up above the snow.

Uh, so they were actually a safety device as well. , so, right. Yeah. So the snow plow wouldn't run into, into your car or. Parked down the street. You know, it's, it's funny that you bring up the little balls because this is gonna again, be one of these anachronisms that's gonna be for younger people. Service stations back in the fifties, sixties, into the seventies.

They gave away so many different things that were related to automotive culture and travel and all of these things, maps and um, just, I remember my parents. Salt shakers, coffee mugs, all these different things. And they were quirky. And I would say, where did you get these from? Where did they come from?

They'd say, oh, you know, they were a giveaway at the gas station, which, you know, in the seventies, late seventies and early eighties, post oil crisis and everything else, that was, uh, I just couldn't wrap my head around. Yeah, wouldn't it be great to have that stuff now? Uh, I mean, huge collector's market for it, I'm sure.

Yes. Cool, cool. All right, so that's a little bit about my roadside beauty, the 76 orange ball, and I've got a little bit more, uh, in my pocket that I want to share after I hear about what you are, are gonna talk about. Okay, perfect. Well, of course when you hit the road you need to get gas. But the other thing that you need to do is find a place to stay.

And that's really where my roadside icon comes in. Um, so we are all familiar with the hotel chain Holiday Inn, of course. Mm-hmm. , but people of a certain age will always associate the name with what's known as the Great sign. So what do I mean by the great sign? It is this two-sided, 50 foot high holiday sign.

I mean, these things were incredible and as a little kid, I love them. I can't but five stories. I can't believe it was that tall. Wow. And I think I love them for some of the same reasons you just mentioned with the UNICAL 76 sign. Mm-hmm. . Mm-hmm. , one of the biggest ones was that it had movement to it. Now it didn't have movement in the sense that there were physical.

Pieces moving around. There wasn't a rotating sphere or anything like that, right. But it was trimmed in these winking lights tracing the contours of a golden arrow at the edge of the sign pointing from the road to the hotel itself. So this was something that was very literal, but done in a very, very fun way.

Like you're looking for the Holiday Inn. It is right this way. Like here's literally, here's where the building is. Come here. Yeah, yeah, exactly. Come. And then it was also topped by a pulsing radiating five pointed star with different colored bursts surrounding it. So like rays of light that were different colors emanating from.

The star, and this was so great because this was neon at its finest. This was really kind of this period where if you wanted to make something amazing, it had neon. Think about the giant arby signs that you will still occasionally find today. Uhhuh with all the neon traced in the moving winking lights on the outside edges of the hat.

Same sort of idea. Um, and then in the middle there. Green, this huge green area. Holiday Inn was written in white script at night. The Holiday Inn lit up white and you couldn't see the green. It was basically black, but then, Each one of these signs had something that was unique to each of the properties.

So there was a white, rectangular back lit marquee area with removable letters that allowed for each location opposed a welcome message to convention attendees or advertise the food that. Was being served in the restaurant charcoal steaks. Mm-hmm. or plug a musical act performing in the lounge area.

Every band on the planet has had their picture taken in front of the holiday sign advertising their performance. I guarantee you. Yeah. Yeah. It was such a cultural landmark as well as a physical landmark and the design work both during the day, and it also worked at night after dark beckoning weary travelers to take a break for the night and spend time at the hotel.

So, I just love this icon. And so just like your origin story, this sign has a really great origin story as well. It was called The Great Sign. Mm-hmm. . And it was used really during Holiday Inn's expansion. The 1950s through the 1970s was this period of, um, rapid expansion for the. And really it was probably their most successful form of advertising.

It was large and it was eye-catching, but the challenge is it was also very expensive to construct and operate. You had mentioned the $50,000 Unical, 76 side. Mm-hmm. . So this sign in the 1950s, the original. Cost $13,000. And the reason I asked you about the price today is because I ran the numbers for the Holiday Inn Great sign.

So the original $13,000 sign today would cost more than $125,000. Wow. So, Uh, I'm, I can't even begin to know how many signs they had throughout the country because they were, they were everywhere. They were in every city. Yeah, they were all over the place. So who created this sign? Where did it come from?

The manufacturer of the sign was, Bolton and Son Sign Company in Memphis, which is where Holiday Inn was headquartered. And this company is still around today as Bolton Sign Company. And the artists that put the sign together were Jean Barber and Roland Alexander, who were employed by the company. And so the founder of Holiday Inn, who we'll talk about in a minute, wanted a prominent.

And he was the one who declared that it should be at least 50 feet high and visible in both directions. He was also the one who came up with the idea of the marquee so that it could be customized for different groups. So we talked about some of the signs, colors, green, white, yellow, and it said that those colors were chosen because they were the favorite of the founder's, mother

So some things never change, right? Yes, exactly. Exactly. So what was interesting though is the popularity of the sign, because it was such a cultural landmark, and if you can imagine. In the hospitality industry. It was a huge landmark. It led to many imitations, some of which are still around today. And as you mentioned, this sign was all over the place.

It was all over the country. You know, there were tons of these signs when the eighties rolled around with most cool things unappreciated at the time. As Holiday Inn was sold and changed hands, most of these signs were scrap. In the 1980s, and they were being replaced with backlit signs that were less expensive.

They conformed to increasingly strict sign zoning ordinances. All these sorts of things. So there are still a handful of these signs around today, but none of them are quote unquote in the wild. So the first sign is at the American Sign Museum in Cincinnati, and I've actually visited this museum, and if anyone is ever passing through or lives near Cincinnati, I highly, highly suggest you go visit this museum.

It is incredible visual feast tru. The second sign is found at the National Save the Neon Signs Museum in Minot, North Dakota. So wow. Huge difference between Cincinnati, Ohio and Minot, North Dakota. But that just shows the, um, the footprint of Holiday Inn and Uhhuh where these signs were living. The third one is a miniature one found in Dearborn, Michigan at Greenfield Village.

You know, the Henry Ford Museum. Right. Right. And then the fourth one is in the hands of a private collector somewhere in Kentucky. So we should go and find this person and become friends with him, don't you think? Absolutely. Absolutely. So we could put our names on the, uh, on the board and have our picture taken in front of it.

Yes. So tell me a little bit more about 76 and uh, sure. You know, some of the other things that were happening around this sign, because I'm very curious. Sure, sure. Um, well, and I actually checked, uh, while you were talking about the inflation rate of the signs, uh, when they first went up and the original orange ball, 76, uh, orange ball that was made for the World's Fair in 1962 cost $50,000, which would be $430,000 today.

So, wow. Um, you know, even for probably a deep pocket oil. Uh, popping out, you know, 430,000 per sign is probably a little bit too much. So that brings me to the topic of what happens with all great signs, and you mentioned this as well in the eighties for Holiday Inn. Is. They start coming down because there's some expense there that probably could be saved.

I did mention that Unica went through a series of sales and mergers and, um, they were eventually sold to Tasco Corporation, which then became part of Conoco Phillips, which is, as I said today, they're owned by Phillip. So back in 2003, so they were up for a long time. Back in 2003, they started to come down and they did it pretty quietly At the same time, they were trying to merge the brands together.

Uh, with the Phillips 66 brand. So they were also changing the signs from the spherical orange ball to, uh, more of a flat round sign. Uh, and they were also changing the color to kind of a reddish color, not orange anymore. So as look would have it, a lot of people. Uh, they discovered love these giant 76 orange balls.

And in 2006, a woman in LA named Kim Cooper co-founded a grassroots campaign website and online petition. She called Save the 76 ball.com, and it attracted about 3000 signatures and it, and at the time it persuaded Conoco Phillips to install between 75 and a hundred newly. Red balls in high traffic areas in California.

So they changed the orange to red, but they were still spherical, uh, in California since there was a lot of love for Unical in California. And then they also agreed to save about 30 of the original ones for museums. You mentioned the American Sign Museum in Cincinnati. I've never been, would love to go.

One of these 76 balls. Is there also the Museum of Neon Art and Glendale, California has one. The very first artifact moved into the NASCAR Hall of Fame in Charlotte, North Carolina was a 76 orange ball, and uh, they were trying to get them in the Smithsonian and also Peterson Automotive, uh, museum, which is in, uh, California as well.

But I could not get confirmation of those. Now, here's an interesting thing I just mentioned about the first artifact for the NASCAR Hall of Fame in Charlotte. Now, Elliot, you know, I grew up with nascar, right? My dad was a huge NASCAR fan. This was before it was cool, right? . Uh, I know some people may say it's still not, but, uh, this was way before it was.

Anyway, he would take me to the Daytona Speedway and we would stay in the infield area where you could camp. And they had these orange balls on all four turns of the speedway. They were installed in 1969 and they looked like these groovy orange space ships. Uh, they were bigger than the eight foot ones that were used for signs, but because they were used as official spotter platform.

So spotters, officials of the race would climb up into these orange balls all around the speedway, and they would be able to tell what the driver's position was, things like that. If there was an accident, you know, they would be up there with their binoculars and walkie-talkies, and it's one of those guys, one of those spotter balls.

That was the first artifact into the NASCAR Hall of Fame. Unfortunately, union 76 discontinued their NASCAR relat. At the end of the 2003 season, which coincides with when they started bringing these balls down. So no more of those, uh, at nascar speedways either, but it was a huge part of the racing landscape.

It was everywhere. It was t-shirts and stickers and um, license plates and decals and obviously signs. And to me, being kind of influential at that age, what I saw it as was the ultimate in minimalism, the ultimate in shape, color, and type minimalism. It didn't need very much to get across what it was, and it was so recognizable.

Now here's kind of the interesting. I mentioned about the, uh, save the 76 Ball campaign that was started by Kim Cooper. And one of the things that I realized in sort of reading, uh, articles about her and why she started that is she said there was a 76 station at the corner of her street and. One day she remembered seeing that the ball was missing and she felt disoriented and decided that she wasn't gonna go to that station anymore.

Like it was not the same thing. So it made me think like, These roadside signs, and I'm sure especially Holiday Inn, they are basically pop culture flags. Mm-hmm. , they tell us that we are in a particular place. They're those things where you say, go to the Holiday Inn sign and take a left and then go down two blocks.

And you know what's funny? Like speaking of saving the round ball, orange ball signs, the company was very clear that they couldn't be sold to private collectors only to museums. They didn't want them ending up on eBay and stuff like that. And Ray Peterson, the designer of the original one. Uh, he was asked about the possibility if he were able to keep one, you know, when they were coming down, would he?

And, uh, you gotta love this guy. This is a quote he said. I live in a community with a bunch of Republicans that have their flags up. If I get a ball, I'll put that up on a pole and see what they think about it. That's awesome. . So, to my knowledge, he never did get one. But you know, Mr. Peterson needs an orange ball to fly on his Republican c.

Um, flagpole. Well, it's kind of funny when you think about, um, how republicans are very much for patriotism and fossil fuels and everything like that. There should be very few objections. . It should be, but you know, it probably did not fit the mold of, uh, what they thought should be flying above their community.

True

You know, Elliot, speaking of signs, I'm looking for the one that says restroom right about now, because I could use a quick pit stop. Well, Todd, while you're doing that, I suggest our listeners also take a quick. Grab a fresh drink and meet us back here at the table in a couple of minutes.

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All right. Well, so where are we today with the holiday? Yeah, so the holiday sign Let me tell you a little bit about the chain. And you mentioned this idea of landmarks and um, the origin, not only of the sign, but of the chain is really interesting as well. So when you think about this country and you think about post World War II and our expansion with the interstate system and everything like this, holiday Inn is another character in this story as well.

I'm sure, Todd, we've talked about National Lampoon before. We've talked about movies before. You are very familiar, I'm sure, with the original National Lampoon's vacation. Right? Of course. Who, yeah, who isn't one of the greats. Yes. Yes. So if you think about when Clark and his family were traveling across country, all the little motor courts and campgrounds and all these, Places that, where they stayed and how inconsistent they were and how sketchy they were and all these sorts of things, right?

Mm-hmm. , so this is what Kemmons Wilson, the founder of Holiday Inn, encountered when he was going on a vacation with his family from Memphis, where he. To Washington, DC in the early fifties. Mm-hmm. , he grew very frustrated at the lack of quality in these roadside motels, dingy hotels, dusty motor courts.

These sorts of things might have been satisfactory when people didn't know any better when we were all coming back from the war and setting out on the road. But he wanted to make sure that as the, in. Matured and grew and meant more development and more accessibility across the country, that there would be more sophisticated amenities that would be able to match that with accommodations that were available.

Things that we take for granted today. Air conditioning, restaurants, in room telephones. Mm-hmm. and perhaps most of all standard. Mm-hmm. , and I would say standardization, to answer your question from a minute ago. Mm-hmm. , like what happened with the holiday sign? I would say this very thing that made it.

Develop made it, you know, spring fourth into the world was the very thing that ultimately, uh, hastened its demise as well. Right? Hmm mm-hmm. So within a year of this frustrating road trip vacation, Wilson had commissioned blueprints from diagrams that he had drawn himself. The designer, a guy named Eddie Bluestein wrote Holiday Inn across the bottom of the plans after seeing the Bing Crosby film

So that existed before the hotel did Uhhuh , and he sort of wrote it on there as a joke, but the name actually stuck. So the first in which was built on Summer Avenue in Memphis, Tennessee was so success. That Wilson followed up with identical ones on three other roads leading into Memphis. So this was the beginning of the interstate system.

Wow. And Wilson was featured on the cover, just to give you an idea of the rapid growth of Holiday Inn. So this is in the early fifties. He had this handful of hotel properties and by the time summer of 1972 rolled around, this guy was on the cover of Time Magazine. Wow. He had franchised over 1400 inns across the United States and around the world.

And just to give you an idea of scale, at that time, he had 300,000 bed. And his nearest competitor in terms of scale, he was three times larger than just the nearest competitor. Wow. I mean, it's crazy. Yeah. And going back to the time illustration, certainly he was on the cover, but what else was on the cover with him?

The sign? Yes, of course. Yes. The great sign. Absolutely. So as I mentioned, He, uh, created this sign. You know, if you're gonna have this amazing chain and be consistent, you have to have the signage be consistent. Mm-hmm. , especially when you have these nipping at your heels, imitators, these regional players, he wanted to be the standard.

He wanted to be by default. When people said, Hotel. He wanted them to think Holiday Inn. So we've talked a little bit about the rapid growth. We've talked a little bit about the popularity of the sign, and of course Todd, we have to talk about pop culture as well. So one of my favorite movies that I believe I've mentioned in a past episode or two is The Blues Brothers Absolutely.

And if you recall at the beginning of the Blues Brothers, when Jake and Ellwood are on their mission from God, one of the places they have to stop is the Holiday Inn Uhhuh to recruit Murph in the magic tones who are playing in the lounge. What we will do is we will also post the scene I have found on YouTube, the scene where the Blues Mobile drives into the holiday and parking lot.

Right next to one of the great signs . Nice. So. Todd, one more quick thing that I just wanted to add about the, uh, holiday Inn founder, Kevins Wilson and his love for this sign. You know, this was, if, if Holiday Inn was his child. I don't exactly know what the phrase would be, but this was probably his, his favorite child.

Maybe. I don't exactly know. No. Yeah. What the right metaphor would be, but this. Loved this sign so much. He felt when holiday was sold off, when he stepped away in the eighties and they started to dismantle these great signs mm-hmm. and replace them with more standard, cheaper backlit signs. He thought it was a huge, huge mistake because, and rightly so.

He thought a lot of the brand equity was getting peeled away. Mm-hmm. . Mm-hmm. . This guy, when I say he loved this sign, I mean, in a literal sense, he. To the grave with him. His love of this sign. What do you mean? He has? He has a sign, like at his grave, he has a sign on his grave . Oh man. How awesome is that? He has etched in his tombstone a picture of the great sign.

The arrow in the great sign is pointing at his name and in the marquee area of the great sign, it says, founder. That's better than saying charcoal steak . That's amazing. That might be on the backside of the tombstone. I'm not sure. That's amazing, isn't it? That's amazing. I mean, I can't think, I mean, I've done some logos I'm pretty proud of, but I can't think of one that I would put on my tombstone.

Yeah. Oh, this guy. Yeah. You gotta love it. You gotta, you gotta applaud . I mean, yeah. I, I hope I'm that passionate about something for my entire life, . Yeah. I love it, man. Yeah. And um, there are also several other videos. Tell the story of this sign, which leads me into my three takeaways from this sign. There were just three things that I felt.

We're just so gratifying that I found as I was doing research for this episode. The first one is very simple. People love this sign. Mm-hmm. . So I knew it was a cultural touchstone for me personally. I just remember as a little kid, I would always, when I was driving with my parents, I was so excited seeing signs.

I think it was because I could read them. I think it was because I knew enough to know. Letters could come in many different forms in many different ways. Mm-hmm. , you think about, mm-hmm. , for example, the Holiday Inn words were script, but then the marquee area underneath had these black and white removable letters, or sometimes they were read.

And I would get so excited about all the different ways that words were being displayed on these signs. It was probably also because you would see these in different cities. So two things there. There was. Familiar sense that you had like, oh wow. There's another one of those cool signs that, uh, I saw last year when we went on vacation.

And the other thing is, it probably is a really nice memory. It connects to vacation time and holiday time for people when they're traveling. Yes, exactly. And almost like the woman you mentioned with a gas station. Mm-hmm. , it was an orientation device. Um, it was something that, well, I might be far from home, but here's something that's still familiar to.

Right. I keep thinking about, it's sort of the same principle as, uh, that McDonald's used when they started franchising. It was such standardization for food and people stopped there when they're traveling because they know what they're gonna get. Yes. And this is the, the hospitality version of that, I guess.

Yes, yes. So doing research for this project, I found so many home videos and tributes with people asking in the comments if any of these signs are still around, we'll post some of these YouTube videos I found. But be sure to read the comments because so many people were sharing their memories because they love this sign too, and they have the same childhood memories that you and I do.

The second thing is this sign influenced so many other sign designs. Like I mentioned earlier, you know, you always have these fast followers in hospitality, just like anything else. So these independent roadside hotels and motels created similar designs, although certainly not as large, right? They weren't any five story signs, right?

But they had to compete somehow, right? And so they were obviously trying to bank on some of this goodwill that this sign format. Engendered with Holiday Inn. So Howard Johnson's, for example, even got in on the act and I would humbly suggest that the strip in Las Vegas, which of course is largely hotels with their spectaculars, owe a debt of gratitude to this sign as well.

Hmm, yeah. Maybe I, I could see where they would influence each. Because yes, that's of their growth's fair at the same time. But, but definitely the, definitely, I'll agree with you that there was common thinking that if you create this wonderful whizbang experience out on the, the curb or the street way as people are driving by, you're gonna pull people in.

Yes, yes. And then number three, like so many iconic touchstones, this sign was a direct result of post World War II prosperity and the development of the interstate system. We have talked before about car culture and new affluence and the mobility that comes through affluence and car. And like so many other things.

Also design and pop culture icons that were exploding after the second World War, so. Right. Right. So for our listeners, that's our street culture episode, if you'd like to go back and listen to that one. So Todd, tell me about some of the things that you were figuring out with 76 as you were living with this, because I just love it too.

Again, one of the things that I take away from this is, It really was the hype of minimalism when it came to signs because it was a round shape. Um, very simple shape. Only had two characters, a seven and a six. Obviously there was built in passion for those two, uh, numbers already. Um, given that they were important in the United States history, so they were already carrying with them.

This feeling of independence. It was also really oddball color. Um, orange and blue, which were probably more of the time in the early 1960s. Um, but yet still, you know, not very common, uh, in signs. Uh, so I took that away that these. Just in itself, there were these shapes, these things, this, this minimalism that, that was a beacon to people.

Mm-hmm. , it helped if you had a passion for a particular type of gasoline or a particular type of station, uh, that you would go there. Now you talked, the second thing is you talked about standardization. For the, uh, the hotels, that was one of the things that 76 were also trying to get across. At the time, they felt like their stations were the cleanest, had the cleanest restrooms, so the minimalism had to.

Communicate that it had to be like very simple, unencumbered stuff, and it made people feel comfortable. Hmm. So I'm thinking about two things. Two totally separate things, but both related to the 76 sign. So the first one is, it's really interesting with minimalism. While the holiday sign, which was really all about this, over the top, Starburst Moving Lights, big Arrow, you had this other sign that was invented during the same time period that.

Purposefully went in the opposite direction. It was a much, much more mm-hmm. streamlined and subtle. And I think that's really interesting. It is. Yeah. And then, you know, going back to, I still have hobo on my mind from our type episode . And do you think that the General Lee, the design and colors of the General Lee, were it all influenced by the 76 ball?

That's a good question. You know, because to my knowledge, Uh, those colors didn't really mean anything in the, the American South. Um, they, they certainly were, you know, they generally had a Confederate flag on the roof. That certainly wasn't the color of the flag. Um, yeah, you know, it possibly could be. I'd never thought about it like that.

It could be, you know, of that time. Uh, so, you know, uh, when we were talking. Dukes of hazard, like mid seventies probably, right? Mm-hmm. . Um, so, you know, probably of that time, uh, that particular color orange was seen as, as kind of a, a little rebellious, it was, it was seen as something that you wouldn't see in a, in a, in a corporate brand manual.

Um, it was a little bit, uh, a a little bit bright, a little bit sort of in your face, so that's interesting. I, I hadn't thought about. Well, this has been another wonderful trip down memory lane. I really think we both chose really, really good iconic roadside beauties. Yeah, man. And you know what, uh, we've gotta get up to the museum in Cincinnati and see some of these, some of these beauties live.

Yes, I would love that. And if we ever do, we'll have to take some video, take some photos, and uh, post them for all our bar buddies to have a. Absolutely. Speaking of, let's get back to the bar. Yep. Sounds great. I need to refresh my drink.

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